Alpha's Regret: The Luna He Left Behind novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: Before Three Hundred Wolves
Thane rejects Freya from the Moon Hall dais and names Lorna to stand beside him. Freya hands back the Luna's ring and the bond snaps, and Thane is the one who drops to a knee.
At the autumn gathering, Thane Ashgrove stood on the dais of the pack hall and told three hundred wolves that his Luna was no use to him.
I was in the front row, in my chair, with a blanket over my knees.
My best friend sat beside me with her hand on my shoulder.
The pack healer had changed my bandage that morning, the way she had every morning for five weeks.
She had knelt on my floor and unwound the cloth from my left forearm while I told her what my friend had heard in the bakery line.
"He'd never," the healer said. "The elders are frightened, that's all. Tonight he'll stand up and call you his Luna. Trust me."
Then she took my wrist and felt my pulse with two fingers.
"Still racing, and you're still burning up," she said. "That's the wound fever, Freya. It will pass."
I had been hot all day, every day, since the ford. I wore a sweater in October and still wanted the window open.
On the dais, Thane coughed into his fist.
He had a cold. It was the first cold of his life, and he sniffled through every pause.
"Five weeks ago, rogues crossed our line at the ford," he said. "Our Luna was hurt in the fight."
Nobody moved.
"She can't shift. She can't stand. She can't run the Hunt beside me, and she can't stand at my back in this hall."
He still wasn't looking at me.
"A Luna the pack has to carry is a danger to the pack."
Somebody near the back said, "Shame." I couldn't tell if it was for me or for him.
At the Beta's table, Luther Ellerby sat with his arms crossed and his chin down.
He didn't look surprised.
"Freya Dahl," Thane said. He was looking at the back wall. "I reject you as my mate, and as Luna of Redwater."
A sound went through the hall, three hundred people drawing in air.
Trudy swore under her breath. "Freya, say something."
"Wait," I said.
"I name Lorna Ellerby to stand at my side."
The side door opened and Lorna walked out, already in a white gown, her red hair brushed and pinned.
She had not dressed for a gathering at seven this morning. She had dressed for this.
She didn't look at me either.
I put my hands on the wheels and rolled myself up the middle aisle.
The dais had three steps and no ramp. I stopped at the bottom of them.
Thane stood at the top. For five weeks he had come to the infirmary door and gone away again without speaking. Now he looked down at me.
His eyes were dull. They used to be a clear amber.
I pulled the Luna's ring off my finger and held it up.
"Come down and take it," I said.
"The Alpha does not descend," Luther said from his table.
"I'm not asking the Alpha," I said. "I'm asking the man who put it on my hand."
For a long moment nothing happened. Then Thane came down all three steps.
He was close enough that I could smell the cold medicine on him.
I turned his hand over and put the ring in his palm. His fingers were cold.
"I accept it," I said. "Say the rest, so it's done."
His jaw worked. "The bond is cut."
Something snapped inside my chest, loud enough that I flinched.
I gripped the arms of my chair and waited for the pain to take me down.
It didn't come. Heat rose through me, from my ribs to the top of my head. The ache in my arm stopped.
A thump hit the boards beside me.
Thane had dropped to one knee, one hand flat on the floor, his breath ragged.
"He's overcome," Lorna said, hurrying down to him with her skirt in her fist. "Give him air. Everybody back."
Luther was already on his feet.
"Freya Dahl," he said. "You are off Redwater land by dawn. That is the law."
Nobody argued with him.
I looked at my left hand on the wheel. For five weeks it had trembled when I lifted a cup.
It was perfectly still.
I had expected to fall.
I felt stronger than I had since the ford.
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